RDA 9.3.2 Date of birth and RDA 9.3.3 Date of death are specific elements to identify a person. They are "Core", meaning they should be included in a description of a person. Only the date (may include year, month, and day) needs to be given, as the name of the element identifies it as birth or death - no matter the language.
When using the dates in constructing access points, RDA 9.19.1.3 instructs adding the date of birth and/or date of death, if necessary, to distinguish one access point from another. There is an optional addition to always add dates associated with a person, even if there is no need to distinguish. The examples are there to suggest how that could be structured for a catalog to be used by English speakers. For a non-English catalog, the English term "born" or "died" (if needed) would be replaced by appropriate terms in the language of the cataloging agency. As stated in RDA 0.10 Examples, "All examples illustrate elements as they would be recorded by an agency whose preferred language is English." Barbara Tillett - Chair, JSC -----Original Message----- From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA] On Behalf Of Joseph, Angelina Sent: Friday, January 27, 2012 10:15 AM To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Showing birth and death dates We are talking about English, French and German. What about other languages of the world? Is not universality the whole scope of RDA? Pardon me if I am wrong? --angelina joseph Marquette University Milwaukee, WI -----Original Message----- From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [mailto:RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA] On Behalf Of J. McRee Elrod Sent: Wednesday, January 18, 2012 6:51 PM To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA Subject: [RDA-L] Showing birth and death dates Friend Hal from down under has pointed out yet another problem with RDA words rather than hyphens, when only one of birth or death date is known. The words in French would differ with gender: "... the need to distinguish gender in French: né masc., née fem. for 'born', mort/morte for 'died'." __ __ J. McRee (Mac) Elrod (m...@slc.bc.ca) {__ | / Special Libraries Cataloguing HTTP://www.slc.bc.ca/ ___} |__ \__________________________________________________________
